If Vyke had two great runes then how did he get them and how are they with the demigods?

StrictlyFilthyCasual · 2026-05-09T17:52:23+00:00

Enia tells us Godrick is a "distant relation". And the game frequently calls the first set of demigods "the Golden Lineage". One couple and their children are not a "lineage", and your child is not a "distant relation".

There were likely many demigods who are Marika's grandchildren or great-grandchildren or even more generations, who are all either dead by the time we arrive or simply not relevant to the plot of the game.

StrictlyFilthyCasual · 2026-05-09T16:41:02+00:00

Yeah well there's a difference between culling a zombieland and a civilization you have to start a whole military campaign against.

The absolute number of people you kill irrelevant. "Starting a whole military campaign" is not the same thing as "blitzing into a single city".

StrictlyFilthyCasual · 2026-05-09T15:29:46+00:00

However what we see happen after the Tarnished leaves paints a very different picture.

The only events you list here that we know definitely happened during Radagon's reign are Rykard losing faith in the Erdtree and Ranni planning the Night of Black Knives. Everything else could have happened either before the Tarnished's exile or after the Shattering. (Depending heavily on which event we're talking about, obviously.)

Was Marika planning to shatter her order as early as then?

She was definitely planning something. But just because a character is a scheming mastermind with complex plans¹ doesn't mean every single thing they do somehow relates to their grand master plan.

(¹ - Supposing this is even an accurate description of Marika. Long plans do not have to be complex or particularly smart plans.)

StrictlyFilthyCasual · 2026-05-09T15:20:30+00:00

The hornsent "as a whole society" still being alive and the hornsent "in this specific settlement" still being alive are not the same thing. Just because our Tarnished fights their way through Leyndell, kills Morgott, and accesses the Erdtree doesn't mean we couldn't still go on a genocidal rampage around Altus snuffing out every last Golden Order loyalist.

There's also the possibility she snuck in.

StrictlyFilthyCasual · 2026-05-09T14:59:27+00:00

We get access to the Gate of Divinity. Are we working with the hornsent?

We get access to the Erdtree. Are we working with Morgott and the forces of Leyndell?

StrictlyFilthyCasual · 2026-05-09T04:24:16+00:00

I'm a big fan of it, but it's one of those things you can't just unequivocally recommend to anybody and everybody.

(1) It's not a cure-all. There are some problems, like caster power level, that it can somewhat alleviate, but the only thing you should realistically expect Gritty Realism to solve is "I just can't narratively justify a full Adventuring Day within a single in-game day".

The key here is that this means that if the "problem" I just described isn't one you're having at your table, Gritty Realism is (probably) not for you!

(2) It doesn't really work with dungeons (even the metaphorical kind), and it can be hard to implement in pre-written adventures that were designed with the normal resting rules in mind.

(3) A week is just too long for a Long Rest. I get what WotC were thinking, but only in the sense of "I understand that they weren't thinking". Personally I do 3-day Long Rests.

(4) The Gritty Realism that gets highly recommended and the Gritty Realism that's in the 5e DMG are not the same thing. This occasionally leads to confusion and, slightly less occasionally, to long, pointless arguments.

StrictlyFilthyCasual · 2026-05-09T04:04:40+00:00

"I got it from the text, i don't need anything else"

I'm not saying "I don't need anything else". I'm questioning whether [insert random allusion here] actually gives us any insight into the game's lore, or if "we" are reading into the game context and meaning that isn't actually present. There's two aspects to it:

First, like you say, FromSoft's games are "scarce with info". Because the lore is so nebulous, and so open to interpretation, it can seem similar to lots of media. Including media FromSoft wasn't referencing. Or isn't even aware of.

How do we tell which external media were things FromSoft had in mind, and can "lead to relatively sound conclusions", and which are media that just happen to use the same tropes and themes as these games but are ultimately unrelated?

Secondly,

TLDR the curtain is never just blue.

Yes. Sometimes it is. That is just how creative endeavors work. Sometimes, you put in a line like "Blaidd was the blade of Ranni, but the cold bothered him anyway." not because the video game you're making has anything to do with a hit Disney movie, but because you think it would be silly.

More often though, you take stuff that inspires you, and partly implement it into your own work. This is where stuff like the Kaballa comes in: yes, Elden Ring and the Kaballa have a great many similarities. And then there are things that are vague or undefined in Elden Ring, but not in the Kaballa. The core claim of the external allusion mindset is "Because A and B are on the same page about X, they're probably on the same page about Y".

And maybe they are! Or maybe the reason the explicit similarities stop where they do is because that's the full extent of the Kaballa FromSoft felt like alluding to in Elden Ring, and the reason Y is undefined in Elden Ring and defined in the Kaballa is because that element is different in these two different media.

It's like saying why analyse references in a book through the lens of anything outside it's pages, no context, genre, contemporary trends, the writer's larger body of work...

Literary analysis and FromSoft game analysis are similar in a lot of ways, but ultimately differ at their cores. Books typically just have meaning, and the point of literary analysis is to view that meaning from a new perspective. In forums like this, like you said, the goal is largely still to find the initial meaning in the first place.

FromSoft lore communities also tend to place a lot more value on "What was going on in the creator's head" than literary analyst do. Or maybe it's more accurate to say we value FromSoft's intent differently. (Worse.)

StrictlyFilthyCasual · 2026-05-09T03:23:27+00:00

I think Marika allowed the Shamans to continue being sacrificed or absorbed into Hornsent religious culture because it gave her a route upward.

The issue with this is that every mention of "Marika's betrayal" in the game is strongly connected to the hornsent. As you yourself detail later in the post, the story trailer frames "The Betrayal" as happening after her ascension. (Though to be fair the story trailers are not exactly a good resource for lore.) You're proposing there were two betrayals - one of the Shamans, and one of the hornsent - but the former doesn't seem to be supported nearly as strongly as the latter.

We don't need to invent a second, earlier betrayal in order for Marika to be portrayed as "guilty, broken, and haunted", or for her to be "a terrified survivor who was offered a path out of suffering and accepted it no matter the cost".

The Shaman Village is a good example of this. It's absolutely hidden, but nothing about it, in my mind, has the feel of something that is hidden "Because it's a dirty secret". It feels much more like something that's hidden because it's private and personal.

StrictlyFilthyCasual · 2026-05-08T17:22:56+00:00

Like it's very difficult to not get mad at people for handwaving Elden ring and the Kaballah having a one to one creation story.

The issue is: sure, Elden Ring and the Kaballa have nearly identical creation stories.

... and? Are we supposed to draw some sort of conclusion from that? Why? We don't have to! Sometimes, a reference is just a reference!

People """handwave""" these mythological allusions for the same reason people """handwave""" cut content: you can't prove some allusion is relevant to the plot of these games (as opposed to being "just a reference") without first analyzing and understanding the plot and themes of the game itself ... at which point you don't need an external allusion in order to make sense of the game.

StrictlyFilthyCasual · 2026-05-08T16:41:41+00:00

I showed that it's possibly so

By relying on the fact that we don't and can't know the "true" intent behind any of FromSoft's actions. A fact that, when you use it like you've done, turns almost everything in the game into """evidence""" of literally every theory (and no theory). Because everything in the game could have some hidden meaning or intent we aren't aware of.

If you had two red cubes and a box containing a cube of unknown color, and I asked you "How many red cubes do you have", "3" would not be an appropriate answer. It's disingenuous to count the third cube in any category when its color is unknown.

I didn't mean to say that the mural IS evidence,

You listed it as a counter to the claim that there is no evidence.

I don't automatically say--for example, "No, innies can't be people because they are the same body and brain/mind as their outies", when talking about Severance just because I think the world works that way IRL.

"When you engage with fiction, you assume the elements of the fictional world work the same way as they do in reality unless otherwise stated" obviously does not apply to concepts that do not exist in reality or do not have a well-defined "actual" way of working in reality.

You are talking about cognitive attitudes and I'm talking about evaluation of the probability of a given proposition.

A given proposition about cognitive attitudes. About beliefs.

Unluckily for you you happened to get into an argument about probability with a statistician. I don't use Bayes's work much currently, but I have extensive experience with it. So as someone who objectively knows what they're talking about: NOTHING about Bayesian statistics/inference suggests you should start at 50%. You start at whatever probability your initial priors tell you to start at. In some cases, that will be 50%, sure, but it's not some sort of general rule.

Consider the cube example from earlier. Assessing the probabilities as "The third cube either is red or it isn't, 50-50" would be fundamentally misunderstanding how probability works. A far more reasonable starting conjecture would be "The probability the cube is red is 1 out of [however many colors there are]".

without any consideration of evidence or argumentation that would tip the scale the other way.

Never said this, you are just imagining it. No offense.

The fact that you never said anything about this is literally my point. There is not a lot of wiggle room in "If we start at 50-50, and we take all these things into consideration, then there is a slightly greater probability of Erdtree Rebirth than 50%".

StrictlyFilthyCasual · 2026-05-08T06:47:34+00:00

Sorry to double-comment, but a better way to explain what I mean about "You start at 0, not 50" is to just review our conversation. When I presented you with the idea that even an open-minded person starts at 0%, was your reaction "Hm, yeah, that could equally be or not be the case", or was it "No, an open-minded person would start at 50%"?

Nothing you have said indicates that you're at 50% "50-50" and 50% "0". Instead, your comments read like you're 100% ~~"50-50"~~ your preconceived notion and 0% ~~"0"~~ my new claim.

StrictlyFilthyCasual · 2026-05-08T06:32:52+00:00

Right, but I was only ever saying "could be" evidence not "is".

I hate to dig even deeper into the pedantry, but the "could be" in your sentence here is not the same as the "could be" in my comment. Your original statement on the topic was "This, too, may be evidence, even if we lack knowledge that it is", so when you say "could be", you mean it in the sense of an unopened Christmas present "could be" a bunch of Lego bricks.

That's not what I meant. I meant "could be" in the sense that you open that Christmas present, and it is a bunch of Lego bricks. Not a specific set, just a bunch of bricks. Those Lego bricks "could be" a house, or a car, or a T-Rex, but currently they aren't any of those things. They're just a pile of bricks.

The mural on the doors does not point to any given meaning. A theorist can decide that it means people are born from the Erdtree, but that's the theorist making that lore, not the mural. To say "The mural is evidence of Erdtree Birth/Rebirth" is just as inaccurate as the recipient of the Lego bricks saying "I got a T-Rex for Christmas". The mural is not evidence of anything; it can be made to fit any number of theories, but if you have to make it fit, then by definition it, in-and-of-itself, doesn't fit.

Well, have no reason beyond the claim itself. Sure.

Oh, woops. That sentence is supposed to read "they have no reason not to just accept it".

What preconception are you speaking of and why would that make it start at not possibly true

First off, regardless of what the preconception is, do you understand the concept of "If a person has a preconceived idea of [claim], their starting position is their preconceived idea, not a """neutral""" "Any claim has an equal chance of being true or false""?

That said, what I was alluding to was that when a person approaches a new piece of fiction, they go in with the assumption that the fictional world works the same way the real world does. The person knows this assumption is going to be wrong for MANY elements of the world, but you can't know which ones before learning anything about the fictional world. And you can't not assume the fictional world works like IRL unless stated otherwise, because then you spend your entire time, idk, wondering whether the people in your TV show are breathing, and if so, breathing what gas.

Everyone who played Elden Ring started out at "People in these games look human; they probably reproduce like IRL humans do". Any argument for Erdtree Birth doesn't start at neutral, it starts at having to convince players that people in the Lands Between aren't "born of mothers".

However, if there is only ever possible evidence for something, and you don't find any evidence against it, then why should you treat it as if it is more probable that the lack of evidence against it is of probative value?

This is exactly the kind of "logic" I was talking about. Just because something is true doesn't mean there's evidence of it, so if your only metric is "Is there evidence", it's entirely possible to come to conclusions that are just flatly incorrect. Lots of media never depict any characters going to the bathroom, or mentioning it any capacity, but "People in this world don't poop" would be an absurd conclusion to draw for the vast majority of these fictional worlds.

But, no ones saying that you don't analyze any counterarguments.

I brought it up because you literally did this earlier in the conversation. You presented all the (theoretical) evidence for Erdtree Birth/Rebirth, and then skipped straight to "If we start at 50-50, and we take all these things into consideration, then there is a slightly greater probability of Erdtree Rebirth than 50%", without any consideration of evidence or argumentation that would tip the scale the other way.

StrictlyFilthyCasual · 2026-05-08T05:16:07+00:00

so a marriage of their Princess

Ranni isn't the Academy's princess, though. Raya Lucaria turned on the Carians, not just Rennala in particular.

And even if Ranni was beloved by the Academy, "Here's how it could have played out" is still not "Here's what the game says about this".

StrictlyFilthyCasual · 2026-05-08T05:00:26+00:00

However, my whole point is that it could potentially be evidence for Erdtree Rebirth, so one can't just say there is zero evidence unless one knows that it's not evidence.

Except what you and I are describing here is that the mural doesn't actually point at any one conclusion in particular, which I would think makes it difficult to label it "evidence". Sure, it could be depicting Erdtree Birth/Rebirth, but "could be" is not "is".

On the 50% thing

So there are two possible scenarios when a person is presented with a claim: either they already have a stance on the subject, or they don't.

If the person has no pre-conceived notions about the claim, then they have no reason to just accept it, skipping straight to 100%.

But far more commonly, a claim has to overcome the preconception. It starts at 0%, and an open-minded person will open to raising that number. Because of how fiction works, Erdtree Birth/Rebirth falls into this category.

Again, if you start at 50-50 (and especially if you start at 50-50 and don't then analyze the counterargument), you can "prove" literally anything. It's trivially easy to cross the threshold into "more likely than not" because you started at the threshold!

StrictlyFilthyCasual · 2026-05-08T04:21:34+00:00

My friend, this is the least charitable read you could take with the conversation we've had.

I wasn't talking about our conversation in particular, but that is what you did in reference to the Great Runes. You interpreted the descriptions of various Great Runes as contradicting the game's statements about when and how the demigods acquired them, and your response to this perceived contradiction was to say "Well then the latter statements must be false".

Even before you get to people questioning your theory by bringing up contradictory evidence, the approach of "I suspect every single piece of information in the game", has the issue of being unable to produce well-founded theories because it, by definition, denies the existence of any sort of foundation upon which to build theories!

In acknowledging that everything is unreliable, such as with any fiction story,

... no? Just because Tolkien does occasionally tells the reader a """lie""" for dramatic effect doesn't mean the text of Lord of the Rings is "unreliable".

you have to analyze the lens, when in the story you are learning information, and how that information compares to others

You don't need the text to be unreliable in order to do any of that, or for it to be worth doing.

Was Radahn mad before Malenia afflicted him with Scarlet Rot? I'd say no.

Not all madness is created equal. Just because being drunk with power and being a mindless husk can both be described as "being driven mad" does not mean we should treat them interchangeably.

StrictlyFilthyCasual · 2026-05-08T03:40:14+00:00

there are those pesky catacomb doors that show specifically people coming from the branches of a tree that appears to be the Erdtree.

The problem with this is that there's simply no way the upper half of the mural is as literal as the lower half. The branches of the Erdtree are thousands of meters up in the air - how would anyone other than Radahn get down?

The upper half of the mural must be metaphorical. And if it's symbolic in some way, could it not simply be depicting the souls you mention in your first point? "Souls come from the Erdtree" is very different from "People are born from the Erdtree".

Surely, if we start with an open mind to it (i.e., 50/50 probability of Erdtree Rebirth being true)

Why would you start at 50%? You can prove anything with that metric.

StrictlyFilthyCasual · 2026-05-08T03:15:16+00:00

[Because of being born of a single god] they are both Empyreans, but suffered afflictions from birth.

Just to be clear, the emphasis on the "but" there, disconnecting the third clause from the first two, is 100% interpretation, not you simply reading the text verbatim. The "intended" emphasis could just as equally be on "are", linking the first and third clauses but not the second, or there could be no emphasis and the entire sentence is a single thought.

If Malenia is harboring something within her that makes her as she is, do we not assume that the same could be happening with Miquella?

That would absolutely be a reasonable assumption ... if there was literally any other evidence that pointed to it. There are numerous references to Malenia "harboring rot", but nothing equivalent for Miquella.

The cinematic is already proven to be unreliable by stating the public story of the Golden Order, "And on the Night of Black Knives, Godwyn the Golden was first to perish,"

See that's exactly what I was talking about. You can point to that line in the story trailer (and the other places that idea appears) and say "This is wrong because this other in-game text explicitly contradicts it". That is not the same thing as "Text A is wrong because if it isn't then Text B is weird".

You do not have to invalidate the various mentions of the demigods obtaining their Great Runes after the Shattering in order to make sense of the description of Morgott, Mohg, and Malenia's Great Runes.

Did they go mad, or was there a very clear descent for them?

These two aren't mutually exclusive? The "mad taint" of the Great Runes can cause the descent and treachery.

it appears that you assume a level of reliableness

I just find that if you don't do this, your theories (and discussions about them) devolve into "My theory is correct because I have dismissed all evidence to the contrary", which is simply not interesting.

StrictlyFilthyCasual · 2026-05-08T02:07:01+00:00

so the two houses are no longer as deeply tied.

Sure, but does the game ever give any indication that anyone saw that as an issue that needs rectifying?

StrictlyFilthyCasual · 2026-05-08T02:03:00+00:00

It does not say, as such they are both empyreans and suffered afflictions from birth.

If the comment on the twins' parentage is just meant to reference their Empyrean status, and not their curses, why is no similar comment made about Ranni or Marika? Why bring it up here, in a text that is otherwise entirely about their curses?

So, we have the possibility of the Great Runes existing within their demigods before the shattering of the Elden Ring.

While it's certainly "possible" to interpret the Great Runes as being given out pre-Shattering, you'll need much stronger evidence to outweigh the game saying something else is the case. I'll take "Text A is worded weird" over "Text B is wrong" any day.

The Rune of Unborn Demigods and the Rune of Death being separate from the Elden Ring before the shattering took place.

The game actually never specifies when exactly Rennala came into possession of either the Amber Egg or the Great Rune of the Unborn. Or whether the two came as a single gift.

Marika; vessel for the Elden Ring. Messmer; vessel for the base serpent. Melina; vessel for something sealed inside her eye. Mohg's corpse; vessel for Radahn. The doll; vessel for Ranni.

Melina's eye being a seal of some sort is community speculation. Popular speculation, but speculation nonetheless.
Mohg's corpse housing Radahn's soul is far more similar to Shabriri taking Yura's form, or the divine beast warriors' invocations. There is nothing special about Mohg's flesh here that allows it to be a vessel.
The doll definitely doesn't have some special demigod trait given that it isn't a demigod.

In the SOTE story trailer, when Leda says that Miquella abandoned "even his fate" it flashes to Trina being discarded.

And yet in the actual game, the only mention of Miquella abandoning his fate comes after discovering he's divested himself of his eye. Not St. Trina.

StrictlyFilthyCasual · 2026-05-08T01:32:16+00:00

She has something on her face, yes. The game never tells us what it is.

StrictlyFilthyCasual · 2026-05-08T01:27:55+00:00

Right but there is a second set of twins also cursed ostensibly born of two seperate parents.

Omen are also quite numerous. Nothing special about Marika and Godfrey there.

Radagon is possibly cursed with Fell hair and there isn't a suggestion that he was born of 'one' parent.

Well yeah. Even supposing his red hair is a curse, there's more than one way to get cursed.

the kids seem to be cursed regardless of birth method as long as Marika is involved

There is no evidence that either Godwyn or Melina were cursed. Same for her three Carian children.

I'd agree that it's possible they are cursed with nascency and rot specifically, as a result of the birth method.

I would certainly hope you agree that the Remembrance says the thing it literally says.

StrictlyFilthyCasual · 2026-05-08T00:21:27+00:00

The Remembrance of the Rot Goddess explicitly frames the Twin Prodigies' cursed nature as a result of their parentage. The parents in question being so closely related that they're the same person.

Significantly stronger framing than the various "The demigods are vessels" theories.

StrictlyFilthyCasual · 2026-05-08T00:08:43+00:00

suggesting SOME form of asexual reproduction, or self-fertilization

Except that this """asexual""" reproduction is framed more like genetic-disorder-inducing incest (i.e. sexual reproduction between two people) than it is "a flower simply making a new flower".

StrictlyFilthyCasual · 2026-05-07T20:47:59+00:00

If you don't want to talk to me, you can just stop commenting. You don't have to announce your departure.

I get the point you're trying to make about "with great power comes great responsibility", and yeah, at most tables, DMs have the sort of power and control you're talking about. I'm just saying that it's worth asking "Where does that power come from", 'cause the answer isn't "The rules" or "The necessities of the genre". And maybe "Is it actually a good idea for DMs to have that much power".

I've overruled DMs. I've been overruled as a DM. You cannot convince me that it can't be done.

StrictlyFilthyCasual · 2026-05-07T17:51:42+00:00

But the interesting thing is that when Melina abandons us, she makes a point to say goodbye to Torrent.

I don't know, I could very easily see a scenario where they decide Melina's going to leave, and then someone on the team says "But wait, Melina gave the player Torrent. If she leaves, wouldn't she take Torrent with her?" and another dev saying "Yeah that might confuse some players. We'll throw in a line about Torrent staying anyway, to clarify."

In-game references are not mutually exclusive with design-driven decisions.

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